many more Kieran Tierney has made sure that Celtic will not only be well served by him for hopefully a very long time, but because of his displays he will encourage other young players to look more favourably at the defensive positions in a football team when they are growing up.

When I was young (a long time ago) and playing for the school team in a Saturday morning and then St John’s Boys Guild in the afternoon, nobody really wanted to play in defence, except maybe boys who were of the taller variety who would want to be a centre half or even a goalkeeper.

All the young boys wanted to be Pele or Denis Law, or even Jimmy Greaves, it was those type of players who got all the glory by scoring the winning goals in Cup Finals, very few defensive players scored goals then, Big Billy was an exception to the rule.

But at Celtic it’s become a bit different over the last year, a lot of young kids will still want to be the next Moussa Dembele or Scotty Sinclair, or James Forrest or Paddy Roberts, but an awful lot want to be the next Kieran Tierney, and that is entirely down to how KT plays the game and applies himself.

At a very young age he has become a fantastic role model for any young boy hoping to make a living playing football, not too many players of his age have that type of effect on young kids, so KT deserves lots of credit for how much he has progressed in such a short time, even the world class Danny Mc Grain hadn’t made his debut as young as Kieran, he was trying to break into the Lisbon Lions team mind you, and if Kieran achieves as much as Danny I’m sure he will be well chuffed.

The anti-Celtic Scottish Media have already played their part in trying unsettle Kieran with all their talk of Manchester Utd, I’m sure Kieran treats those comments with the contempt they deserve. He may well in the future move on to play in a better League, but he’ll never move on to play in a better team than Glasgow Celtic, I’m absolutely certain that the thought of leaving his beloved Celtic at his young age does not appeal to him.

We have to be honest as well and say it’s brilliant that our Club is in such a fantastic financially healthy state that we don’t have to sell players like Kieran, Moussa, or Scotty. It’s also brilliant that the Manager doesn’t want to sell his best players, but the reality is that someday they will want to move, we all know what money is available elsewhere, it’s not our fault, it’s the nature of the game in Scotland, and until we can move to a League more suited to our great club we have to live with it.

Celtic are the dominant force in Scottish Football, which should not come as a surprise to anyone. The club is managed in a daily basis by the top men and women in their particular fields, whether that be hospitality, marketing, or even charity, that’s what the other clubs should aspire to, learn from the best.

Instead of learning how to improve your own product, we had clowns like Stuart Gilmour in charge at St Mirren, he voted against a proposal for reconstruction a few years ago, simply because Celtic were pushing it. I’m not voting for any Fxxxxxg Celtic Rule Book was his input, no wonder the Saints went crashing.

Or over in the other side of the city, it wasn’t a case of how do we stop them doing ten in a row through normal business and football practices? It was easier than that, they just devised a Tax Avoidance Scheme and effectively cheated the rest of Scottish Football, and indeed European Football.

Where did that get them? well it got them a few trophies, and a few bob I suppose, it also got them Liquidation and ultimately the death of their football club, I was not Fergus’s biggest fan in the end, but I admire him for not taking the easy option by reneging on debts. Celtic Football has always done it the right way, it might be the long way, but never the wrong way. 130 Years of Unbroken History, and many many more to come.

Feed

Go to page

The Celtic Supporters Association

The Celtic Supporters Association was the idea of Willie Fanning whose dream became a reality back in September 1944.

These were dark days on and off the pitch with the Second World War still raging and in comparison to those horrors rather more trivialy Celtic were not providing much joy to its supporters and defeat was a regular experience. Indeed the idea of a supporters association came to 27-year-old Willie while watching the Bhoys get thrashed 6-2 at Hamilton.

Willie decided to write to the Daily Record calling on fellow Celtic fans interested in establishing a supporters club to get in touch. A total of 14 people replied. Consequently a meeting was arranged at St Mark's and St Paul's Hall, Chester Street in Shettleston. The meeting proved to be a success - a provisional committee was installed and Willie was elected as President.

By the time of the second meeting at the A.O.H. Hall in Alexandria Parade in Townhead the word had spread. The hall was packed and car loads of supporters from across Glasgow and beyond eager to attend created a traffic jam along the parade.

A constitution was drawn up which allowed the new organosation to become an amalgamation of supporters clubs. Within 12 months membership had rocketed to 700 and the association had won the official endorsement of Celtic FC who handed over the responsibility of distributing match tickets to affiliated branches of the CSA.

The CSA remains a strong and influential body. Apart from following Celtic in massive numbers it has a social club in Glasgow and its annual Supporters Rally is a highlight in the Celtic calendar.

True to the traditions of Celtic FC the CSA also has a proud and continued ethos of raising funds for charity.